How CO2-neutral is the Sun Eco Rider?
By rolfk on Jul 05, 2007
Before releasing our valiant driver into the first hop of the Sun Eco Tour from Hamm to Detmold next week, I head to undergo a test trip with the hybrid bike myself. So this morning, weather cold and windy, light rain added the mix, I went out for a ride of 30 Kilometers:
First lesson learned: To move a bike weighting 65kg you better have support of an electric engine to climb hills and generally sustain to go faster than 12km/h.
Eco Rider and an electric engine? Electricity is typically made from fossil fuels like coal, so we have to count CO2 emissions here. Let's see: The batteries were fully loaded this morning. According to the specs, that's 1296Wh full of finest electrical energy. After the 90-minute ride going 30km with mostly legwork but added electrical support to sustain a speed of 20km/h, the batteries were half-empty. So the non-human energy consumption of the Sun Eo Rider can be estimated at 2,2KWh per 100km. If that amount of electricity would have been created on a coal-fired power plant, 3,7kg of CO2 would have been created. A Toyota Prius creates 12kg of CO2 per 100km, but is able to carry five people plus luggage compared to one lonely biker and his bag in the Eco Rider. Not much of a difference on the CO2 balance sheet!
So we need to buy the electricity from a source who produces CO2 emission-free. 50KWh shold be sufficient for 2000 Kilometers. 50KWh - that's a light bulb switched on for 20 days. Or a small server (300 Watts), running for one week.